File:A history of the birds of Europe, not observed in the British Isles (1859) (14568616758).jpg

Identifier: historybirdsEurIVBree (find matches)
Title: A history of the birds of Europe, not observed in the British Isles
Year: 1859 (1850s)
Authors: Bree, Charles Robert, 1811-1886 Fawcett, Benjamin, 1808-1893, engraver
Subjects: Pictorial works Birds
Publisher: London : Groombridge and Sons ...
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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Halcyon smyrnensis, Of Indtan Atjthoes. It is to the scientific researches of the late lamentedMr. Strickland that we are indebted for the re-discoveryin Asia Minor of this well-known Indian species ofKingfisher. Since then it has been found (as he sur-mised it would) in the adjacent Turkish EuropeanIslands. It was first introduced into the Europeanlist by Bonaparte, as stated by M. Pazzudaki, in hisCatalogue des Oiseaux d Europe/ published in 1856,and it is included in the list of European birdsjjublished by Professor Blasius in 1861, the TurkishEuropean Islands being cited as a locality. Mr. Strickland read a paper at the British Associationat Manchester in 1842, entitled The re-discovery ofHalcyon smijrnensis in Asia Minor, in which heproves that Albins figure of the Smyrna Kingfisher,published in his Natural History of Birds, is inevery respect identical with the bird known in Indiaas the Halcyon smyrnensis; and that the differencebetween that bird and Albins figure arose from the
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5 il Y R N A K I N G F I S I-l E R. SMYRNA KINGFISHER. 319 former being in immature plumage. The following isan extract from this paper:— During my residence at Smyrna in the winter of1835-6, I failed in meeting with any traces of thisbird, although two other species of Alcidinidce, namely,Alcedo isjnda, Linnoeus, and Ceryle rudis, Hasselquist,were not infrequent. The Halcyon smyrnensis, however,belonging as it does to an insectivorous genus, whichis rarely met with far beyond the tropics, couldhardly be expected to occur so far north as Smyrnain the depth of winter. Failing in this attempt, Itook occasion, at a later period, Avhen supplying thatardent and philosophic zoologist, Mr. Edward Forbes,with a list of ornithological desiderata to be sought forin the Levant, to call his particular attention to thelong-lost Smyrna Kingfisher, and I am happj^ to sayhis researches have at last been crowned with success.In a letter from him, dated Maori, on the coast ofLycia, at the end of Febr

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